12 Months, Sixty Dollars and a PS2: October

October

Scooby-Doo: Night of 100 Frights
by THQ


Waaaaaaaaay back in March, when this project was in its infancy I saw the game I wanted to do for October.  It was the perfect Halloween game and from a genre I am not too familiar with.  The game was one of those horror games like Resident Evil where everything was really dark and creepy and there was a mystery plot and lots of opportunities to be startled.  My wife told me to go ahead and buy it, because it may not be there seven months later and I might miss out, but I told her “no, that is not in the spirit of the project.”  Part of the fun of this is going to MUST HAVE MUSIC AND MORE every month and picking out a new game for the project.  So I let it pass, but every month I would check for it to see if it was still there.  Back in August when I picked up the Excalibur game, I saw, to my dismay that it was gone.  My wife was right (there, I said it in print).  Little did I know that my loss was also my gain.

You see, Halloween-esque games are slim pickings right now and there wasn’t much to choose from when I strolled into the second hand last week, but I wasn’t leaving without a game that would get me in the mood for trick-or-treating (do they still do that, or have over-protective grown-ups ruined that also?).  So what I ended up with was Scooby-Doo: Night of 100 Frights.  I was doubtful.  This was obviously a kid-game.  There would be no challenge. The game would be based on the newer incarnations of a character that I loved as a child and thus I would hardly recognize the franchise any longer.  Worst of all, the game play would be watered down and trite.
I love it when I am wrong on all counts.  Scooby-Doo: Night of 100 Frights is some of the most fun I have had during this year of PS2 games.  As I said above, I loved Scooby-Doo as a kid, so there is a natural draw here for me, but the plus is that the game is everything an old school fan could want.  From the classic monsters: The Creeper, Red Beard’s Ghost, the Green Ghost, etc. to the classic opening (redone in pretty decent 3D) to the laugh track and classic Scooby background music, you feel like you are playing the cartoon.  And I’m sorry, but what the hell more could you possibly want from a Scooby-Doo game?

The game is a pretty basic platformer with lots of levels to explore, power-ups to find, and monsters to defeat, but it is totally, and perfectly Scooby-Doo themed.  There are Scooby Snacks to collect, you save your game at the Mystery Machine, your pals Shaggy and the rest of the Scooby gang are on hand to help out, you’ll visit classic Scooby-Doo locales like a spooky lighthouse and, of course, a haunted mansion.  In typical Scooby fashion, there is a simple plot revolving around a girl, her missing uncle, and a new monster known as the Mastermind.  Most, if not all, of the monsters I loved as a kid from the original cartoon are in the game either as boss fights or just regular enemies.  Heck they even got Don Knotts to do voice work!

Nostalgia aside, the game is just fun to play.  The platforming is solid; the level design is smart, if not terribly complex.  There are a lot of areas to explore, and new areas become available when you locate the missing uncle’s various inventions that allow you to jump higher, bash into things, or float through the air.  While the game isn’t super hard, there are plenty of areas that present a challenge to even the most veteran gamer (I’m looking at you Creepy Cannery, and Wreck on the Deck).  Apart from the theming, all of your basic platforming elements are there, lots of traps to avoid, plenty of mini-puzzles to solve by hitting switches or finding keys, and of course, several tedious jumping puzzles.  No platformer is complete without a heaping dose of tedious jumping puzzles. Best of all, there is a lot of replay value.  On top of the levels being fun, there are monster tokens littering the game that, when collected, unlock monster profiles and Scooby trivia in the gallery section.  After getting a few, you’ll be stricken with Pokemon Syndrome and working toward that 100% completion.

Even though this game is nearly a decade old (2002), it is still worth its original retail price.  Scooby-Doo: Night of 100 Frights delivers in every possible way.  There is a reason it went to Sony’s Greatest Hits line the next year following its release.  I have no doubt that this game will get repeated play in my house for years to come.  $5 extremely well spent!

A Closer Look at Haunted House, Then and Now...

At first I was content to let the above cartoon speak for itself, which I think it does.  But then I realized that it was too easy and that you would probably want to know at least a little bit about how the new Haunted House stacks up against its nigh unto thirty year ancestor.  So, I’ll regale you briefly with tales of yore and then give you my opinion.

Haunted House (1981) was the single spookiest game ever.  Throughout the life of the Atari 2600 and well into the era of Nintendo, no game had the jarring ability to startle the beejezus out of me the way Haunted House did.  I mean, the screen was pitch black, and even when you lit a match you could only see what was close by.  Then, while you are diligently exploring the mansion, CRASH! out of nowhere a bat or spider would suddenly appear with a clap of thunder and flash of lightning.  Furthermore, they were on an unstoppable path toward you with only your destruction in mind.  And god forbid that instead of a spider or bat you got Old Man’s Grave’s horrible spirit.  To make matters worse, the appearance of a foe also meant that your light went out and you were totally isolated.  You damn well better hope you know where you are in the mansion because the last thing you want is to run face first into a locked door.  Tensions were always high when playing Haunted House.

Even though the graphics were blocky and simple, even though the house was only four stories high with a regimented floor plan, even though you could beat it in minutes, Haunted House managed to capture something ethereal that later games would approach, but never quite grasp.  The game has the ability to make you nervous while playing it.  It cultivates a real sense of dread every time you open a door or navigate a staircase.  A baddie could be anywhere and worse yet the Ghost could travel right through locked doors meaning that he could menace you literally any second of the game.  And every time that lightning crashed and the screen flashed, your heart jumped.  Where was the monster that set it off?  Were they close?  Where exactly are you and where is the closest exit?  Are you cornered?  RUN!

Sometimes simple is better.  And with those simple, blocky graphics and minimal sound effects, the people at Atari captured lightning in a bottle.  Later horror/thriller games like Resident Evil would capitalize upon the power of the startle effect, having the undead burst out at you through windows and the like, but for all of their graphic gore and realistic sounds, they still only rate second-best in my book.  Which is why I was very nervous when I read last month that Atari was planning on releasing an updated version of the classic that set the bar so high so long ago.

We’ve been down this road before.  Many classic games from the Atari era have seen modern iterations with very mixed results.  Asteroids, Centipede, Pac-man, Space Invaders, all of the greats have “grown-up” into contemporary versions of their perfect, simple selves.  Some of these updates have been fun, and some disastrous, but all in all they really don’t stand much of a chance against their original counterparts.  So a 2010 Haunted House had me very, very skeptical.  But, initial reviews were good and the screenshots and explanations all pointed to the opportunity for something really fun.  Hell, even the price tag, $19.99 was right.  So I gave it a go.


Much to my delight, the game is actually very good.  The fundamental premise is exactly the same as the original game: you must search the mansion and find the pieces of the urn.  The end result is different, you don’t have to flee the house with the urn, instead you have to defeat a ghoulish foe.  But the spirit, if you will excuse the obvious and painful pun, is still there.  Haunted House (2010) is literally a re-imagining of Haunted House (1981) with modern sensibilities.  The main differences are in the execution of the concept.  First, the game isn’t tough as nails like its ancestor could be.  The main element of difficulty that is missing is the darkness.  HH2010 is dark, but it isn’t pitch-black like HH1981.  You will need light sources to navigate the mansion successfully, but you can still see most everything in the house at all times.  The light sources only really increase your visibility and help you find items, levers and treasures.  True, the mansion gets darker as you progress, but it never goes completely dark like the original.  Also, unlike the original, when you get scared by a monster, your game isn’t over, you just start back at the last fireplace you lit.  This means you’ll never encounter the dreaded GAME OVER and have to embark upon your mission anew, but at the same time where the original was at best 10 minutes of game play in length, HH2010 is more like 3 hours.  I would be pretty pissed if I got 2:15 into the game and had to start over from scratch. (Sidebar: I wonder if that is a good thing or a bad thing…)

The game still features the classic monsters to avoid, plus several new ones like gargoyles.  It also features a variety of light sources for you to employ, some of which actually give you offensive capabilities you will need if you are to survive your stay.  A big difference between the newer version and the original is the addition of boss fights.  The house is divided into four sections and at the culmination of each section you will have to combat a different mega-monster.  These boss fights are perhaps the toughest part of the game as they require you to defeat the mega-monster while avoiding being scared to death.  It is an endurance run for sure.

What the game lacks in difficulty it more than makes up for in atmosphere.  Despite the update, the game maintains the creepy feel of its predecessor and even builds upon it some areas.  The main area of note is the sound.  During your time in the mansion you will be beset with a plethora of moans, wails, thumps, rattlings, baby’s cries, and other very, very creepy sounds.  None of these sounds ever manifest in anything material in the game, which only adds to their effect.  I am not kidding when I tell you that playing this game in the dark, late at night, will make you question any errant sounds that might occur in your own home.  That, my friends, is successful theming!

Another nice addition is the inclusion of treasures and journal entries that you can discover as you explore the mansion.  The journal entries will reveal the dark history of the Graves’ family and their spooky home.  The treasures are snarky references to iconic horror film characters from days gone by.  And after you find a few, and read their descriptions, you’ll be making additional trips into the mansion to find the rest.

The game play remains true, if somewhat evolved.  Like in the original, you’ll have to work your way through the mansion which is a maze of locked doors and stairways.  And like the original, you will find keys that help you gain access to areas previously impassible.  But in the modern interpretation, you’ll also need to seek out levers and various colored lanterns to gain admittance to certain areas of the house.  As stated before, the house is divided into four “floors” each subdivided into four areas and each area is completely self-contained, so you’ll never get stuck because you left a key or lantern behind in another area.  As you progress through the mansion, the areas become larger and more complex and you’ll to do more in order to move on to the next area.  And to make things even more fun, there is a great two-player version where you and a friend can work together to solve the riddle of Graves’ Mansion.  This makes some of the later levels a lot easier without taking away from the overall challenge.

FINAL LOOK

I’m honestly rather shocked and impressed at how well Haunted House (2010) compares to the original Haunted House.  Everything from the original is there in spirit if not in form.  The game does not try to reinvent the wheel, nor does it try to improve upon what already works and works well.  Instead Haunted House (2010) feels like an evolved descendant of Haunted House (1981).  Many elements of the modern game are fun homages to the original game: when your light goes out, all you can see are your eyes!  Nothing will ever capture the magic the way that the original Haunted House did, but this new game certainly knows what made the 1981 game so incredible. You can do a whole hell of a lot worse for $19.99, heck for $49.99, and I think that Haunted House (2010) is perfect for fans of the original as well as those exploring Graves’ Mansion for the very first time.  Accusations that the game is “kiddie” are completely unfounded and smack of basement dwelling rejection of anything that isn’t Grand Theft Auto.  This is a great game for anyone and everyone and comes highly recommended from your ol’ pal Stan.  I anticipate playing Haunted House (2010) many more times in the future, particularly around this time of year!

Girl on Girl Games: Metroid: Other M

...Or, Samus Aran is a whiny crybaby with daddy issues. Yes, that's right. Samus, the unapologetic female protagonist of the Metroid games has been downgraded from a bad-ass bounty hunter to a touchy-feely pacifist that lets a MAN tell her what to do. I'm not sure which side of the feminist argument this article puts me on, but politics aside, let's take a nice long look at why Samus' character was ruined the minute she opened her mouth.

The Metroid series has been historically low on story. You're a bounty hunter, exploring strange alien compounds/planets/spaceships. You fight aliens and unstoppable monsters, you get missiles and you turn into a ball that can drop bombs. At the end of the first game, you are revealed to be a woman. After twenty-three years of Metroid games, the people at Nintendo discovered that women have feelings.

Let me see. What kind of feelings do women have? Well, they like small, baby animals--hey, remember that baby Metroid that imprinted on Samus in Super Metroid and then saved her life? Why don't we have Samus, a hardened bounty hunter who kills things for a living, become absolutely obsessed with it?

If you think that's a terrible idea, you might want to hum through the cut scenes as you play Other M.

Ok, so maybe she doesn't become absolutely obsessed, but she does talk about it a great deal, in her new-found soft and feminine voice. The effect is somewhat creepy, leaving me to wonder if Samus' attachment to "the baby" (as she calls it) is really her trying to work out the classic career-versus-family puzzle that confounds so many a modern woman.

What other kinds of emotional baggage do women have? Another ten seconds of stereotyping later reveals that many have issues with their fathers. Since this iteration of Samus is an orphan, she struggles with daddy-issues that focus on her former commanding officer, Adam Malkovich. As the only woman in a male-centric military outfit, Samus recalls Adam singling her out by her gender at every staff meeting. Samus is shown in flashback as a willfully defiant malcontent who disagreed with Adam at every turn, eventually rebelling so far as to leave the military altogether. In retrospect, Samus says she appreciated that Adam referred to her as a "lady". What?

And finally, what would a woman be without...more women.

Women understand other women, correct? It's one of those things like where all us women go to the toilet together and like to shop, and say things like "oh my god, I have to have those shoes" or "Jim just doesn't understand why the toilet paper holder should match the faucet!" When one of us becomes hurt, especially by some man, we get together and watch romantic comedies in our PJ's while eating ice cream. Or something. The point is, women are supposed to have a lot of empathy going, especially for each other. Because we alone know how hard it is to be a woman. Samus, an independent bounty hunter without a mother, who joined the all-male military at a young age, is not immune to this. In fact, she completely understands the motives of the female NPCs without fail, empathizing with their plights.

I'm just going to lay it all on the line. I have no idea why this particular woman is a bounty hunter and not, say, a high school guidance counselor. I'm not at all saying there's something wrong with a character who is complicated and emotional. I'm certainly not saying it's wrong for a woman to have feelings like Samus'. But what I am saying is: why would a hardened, grizzled orphan, who was an excellent soldier but not a good follower, who travels alone as a one-woman robotic killing machine, ever, ever care this much about whether or not she fits in with the military group she initially abandoned?

More emoting after the break!

12 Months, Sixty Dollars and a PS2: September

September

HULK                                                                                        By Universal Interactive

My wife and I have recently been reading Peter David’s truly masterful run on the Incredible Hulk comic book that spanned nearly all of the 1990’s.  David’s writing is inspired and his treatment of the character shows a true appreciation for Stan Lee’s original creation.  Because of this, we both had a renewed interest in all things Hulk.  Thus, whilst scanning the racks at MUST HAVE MUSIC and MORE for this month’s game, the HULK game naturally stood out to us as a potential candidate.  The only drawback was that the game was based, and spawned, from the subpar 2003 Hulk movie, and there was an equal chance that the game would suck just as much as the movie did.  Examining the game case and manual provided some hope: the game did not follow the movie plot, but was more of a sequel!  Even so, there was no promise of a good game, but with our brains enswirled (yep, I just made that up) in Hulkitude (also mine), we decided to just go for it and see what shook out.

The game itself isn’t terrible, just repetitive.  You alternately take turns controlling the Hulk or his alter ego Bruce Banner.  The Hulk levels are pretty straightforward smash ‘em ups, with the occasional mild puzzle (and I mean mild) to solve.  Most of the time as the Hulk you fight off endless waves of bad guys while trying to pursue someone or escape the onslaught of gamma dogs and machine gun fire.  In addition to pulping bad guys, you can also wreck up the place something good because the environments are almost entirely interactive.  A nice feature, but much like punching guys with guns, it can get old fast.  The Banner levels attempt to be more inventive requiring you to use stealth to evade your enemies in direct contrast to the Hulk’s less subtle approach.  As a matter of fact, confrontation as Banner will almost always result in Game Over.  As Banner you must sneak your way around military installations while trying to achieve an objective like synthesizing a cure for your condition or deactivating security controls.  Parts of the Banner levels are kind of like the stuff you do in Red Ninja, only with less finesse and fun.  Also imbedded in the Banner levels are several sequence puzzles that you must unscramble in order to proceed.  These sequence puzzles are generally presented as security codes you must override.  The puzzles are simple, but each one has a time limit that usually means you’ll occasionally need some good old fashioned luck to solve it in time.

In both areas of the game the level design is fairly uninspired.  There are neat parts here and there that give the game potential, but all in all the game is ho-hum.  The Hulk levels are fairly mindless smash ‘em ups, which has the potential to be a lot of fun and very much in the spirit of the character, but the enemies are boring and repetitive as are the Hulk’s limited cache of attacks.  “Oh great, another soldier with an energy shield, first I’ll throw a crate at him, then I’ll pick him up and slam him into the wall.”  Repeat a hundred times…  The high points are all of the various walls and doors you get to smash through as you progress through the levels. The Banner levels provide a little more cerebral stimulation, but the execution is clunky and thus some areas become frustration fests where you begin to question whether or not it is really worth your time to try to sneak past those search lights again and again.  The basic game has a shot at being really fun and the idea of playing as both Banner and the Hulk fully captures the essence of the character, but the game feels churned out instead of crafted and the result is a little dull.

What is not dull is the graphics; I only wish I meant that in a good way.  Everything in this game is shiny.  And I mean everything.  From the Hulk’s skin to General Ryker’s suit, every single surface in this game is shined up to the max.  The cut scenes are the worst.  Everyone looks like they are made of jello in the sunlight.  I think they were going for a cell-shading effect, but the result is a glossy nightmare.  The in-game graphics are better and a have more depth and texture, but overall the game looks over polished.  And if the glare doesn’t blind you, the voice acting might just push you over the edge.  Much like the acting in the film it is based on, the voice acting in this game is extremely heavy handed.  Banner is just as maudlin and gruff as Eric Bana’s film portrayal.  I’m still not sure why he isn’t the Hulk all of the time, as angry and frustrated as he seems…  The rest of the characters are two dimensional and forgettable and I think we are all better for it.

At the end of the day, I will say that the HULK game is far better than the movie it is based on.  Maybe it is because my expectations were less, but unlike the movie I was able to lose myself in the Hulk parts of the game and just enjoy smashing stuff.  I wish the game had inspired me more and was better able to hold my interest, but that may have been asking more than the game was able to give.  At its heart the game has very good intentions, it just cannot seem to fully deliver on any of them.    That being said, I don’t think my five dollars were wasted this month as I was able to eek out at least five dollars worth of entertainment from smashing tanks and tossing oil drums at helicopters.  HULK has the makings of a great Hulk game, but it just wants to be a little more than it is. 

Next month, we enter the home stretch of the “12601” project with only three games and months left!  There are still plenty of…um…interesting games on the shelf, which ones will make their way into my home?  See you next time…

12 Months, Sixty Dollars and a PS2: August

August

Legion:  The Legend of Excalibur   
Midway

Remember back when I foolishly thought that Mobile Light Force 2 was going to be a dungeon crawler ala X-men Legends?  Well, if I was disappointed back then, this month’s game more than makes up for it.  Legion: The Legend of Excalibur (Legion from this point out) is a fairly traditional dungeon crawler wherein you take on the role of King Arthur recruiting and leading the Knights of the Round Table through noble quests worthy of the son of Uther Pendgradon.  Along the way, you’ll rescue terrified villagers, defend besieged castles, and even seek out the Holy Grail.

For its part, Legion is a fairly complex game.  While the fundamental game play is pretty much the same from level to level, the level designs are dynamic and the variety of quests keeps the game fresh.  The introductory levels do not do the game due justice and if you are initially unimpressed by what the game is giving you, stick with it until Percival joins you on the Avalon mission.  Once you gain a few knights to aid you in your quest, the game’s true strengths become apparent.  Each character has different weapons and abilities and will bring their own unique flavor to your quests.  You can take control of the knights who join you (and sometimes it is almost a must), or you can just command them as the King of the Britons.

Game play is pretty solid and despite the instruction manual’s attempt to confuse you, the controls are pretty much pick-up-and-play with a few things to learn here and there.  Controlling each character gives you command of different abilities, strengths and weaknesses and there is enough variety to keep the game interesting depending on how you want to tackle a level.  Stamina stats keep you from using your heaviest attack incessantly, and the swarms of enemies require you to think out your approach to a given a situation.  Navigating the various menus is uncomplicated and keeps from making a simple crawler a logistical mess, a shortfall of the aforementioned X-men Legends game.

If Legion has problem areas they are minimal.  One thing that struck me was the difficulty.  The game isn’t terribly hard, but there are spots that seem insanely difficult.  They seem insanely difficult until you realize the games other major flaw: patience.  With flashbacks to Robotron: 2084, there are parts of this game where the enemies swarm you in what seems like an endless push guaranteed to send you to the game over screen.  However, all is not lost in such a situation.  When faced with overwhelming odds (like the castle siege in level 2) there is usually a place you can retreat to and let the enemy come to you in smaller bunches where you can knock them off with relative ease.  If you are really lucky, this retreat point will also be near a healer so that all of your knights will stay refreshed.  This strategy works for most areas where the game jumps up and bites you in the butt.  So the difficulty in Legion is kind of schizophrenic, but outside of that the game is pretty solid and a lot of fun.

Most of all, it passes the $5 test.  If you can find Legion: The Legend of Excalibur for five dollars, not only is well worth the coinage, it is a shame to pass it up.  If dungeon crawlers are your kind of bag, baby, then Legion is definitely worth adding to your collection.  I hereby declare this five dollar find a winner! 

Next month…Green…

A Closer Look at How the Game Genie Killed Difficulty in Modern Gaming

This is your password, good luck!

or “Why Modern Gamers are Sissies”

In my day video games were hard, seriously ball-busting hard.  We didn’t have endless continues.  We didn’t have fancy memory cards or hard drives.  If you were lucky, and I mean really lucky, your game MIGHT have a battery back-up, but most likely if you were going to be able to save your progress for later play you were going to have to enter a code and chances were damn good that said code was going to be roughly 45 characters long and the game programmers were wise-asses who used goofy-ass fonts that meant you had NO way of telling the difference between “0” and “O” and you better hope like hell you didn’t get confused and switch two characters, because if that code wasn’t exactly right you were screwed.  And most games didn’t have codes anyway so when that screen said “GAME OVER” you hoped and you prayed that they gave you at least one continue so that you could see what was on the next level.  And even if you did get that continue, you were going to have to start back over at the beginning of the very level that killed you.  But it was even money that “GAME OVER” meant “START OVER” and that you were looking at chucking another half hour into levels that you had already struggled through just to get your ass handed to you again by that same boss that just ended your run.  And furthermore this was a common occurrence since the difficulty of games was insane.  Lots of games had cheap, one-hit kills, hit points were a fairly new innovation and not at all easy to come by.  Level designs were insidious and usually ended in a boss fight that required near perfection to win.  And we didn’t have fancy internets or millions of strategy guides either.  If you couldn’t beat a game, you had to hope like hell that your best friend’s older brother was better at the game than you were and would tell you how to use the super secret attack to get past the final boss.  That was it.

But, at the end of the day, when you beat a game, YOU BEAT A GAME.  It was yours, you owned that game.  Why?  Because you invested hours, days, weeks, into that game.  You played every level inside and out, upside down. You beat every bad guy every way possible; you learned every secret, every trick.  You earned the right to say you beat that game and no one can say otherwise.  Beating the game meant something because it was something that required work, effort, and time.

Then came the Game Genie.  Apparently, the lazy, unskilled kids out there were getting bored with video games because they were too hard and they weren’t talented or patient enough to see the harder games through.  The result was the Game Genie, an insidious little device that latched onto your video game and went with it into your console.  Once inserted it would allow you to enter all kinds of nifty codes that would give you access to invincible modes, unlimited lives and continues, unlock all the weapons/items in a game, allow you to select which level to start at, and on and on.  Now the entire game was at your command, nothing would stop you from seeing that ending screen now!  And best of all, you didn’t even have to be good at video games, you just had to know which code to enter!

Continued...

12 Months, Sixty Dollars and a PS2: July

Twelve Months, Sixty Dollars, and one Playstation2…

Prologue
Okay, so my favorite local second hand, MUST HAVE MUSIC AND MORE, has a slew of Playstation 2 games and recently I discovered that a great number of them are being sold for the low, low price of $4.95.  For those of you who have been following along at home, this is how I came across Pryzm , Chapter One: The Last Unicorn, that little gem that I alone made famous last year!  As I was browsing through the stacks the other day I saw a good number of these $5 games that looked at the very least interesting, if not potential diamonds in the rough.  After thinking it over I came to a conclusion:  The PS2 has a vast library and very few catch the attention of the popular culture, but lots and lots of games get released. Somewhere in those stacks of discarded, unloved games must be some really great games just looking for someone to play them and at the risk of five dollars a go, I think it’s worth finding just what is out there.  The result is this on-going experiment, a journey that you and I are going to take through the unwanted library of the PS2.  So strap in, kiddies, we’ve got twelve months, sixty dollars, and a Playstation2 and we’re about to discover what we’ve been missing!
 


July

Alfa Romeo Racing Italiano                                                              
Valcom

In the modern era, there are two kinds of racing games:  simple, fun games for everyone (kart racers and the like) and complex, hardcore racing games that are only for those who are totally into racing.  Alfa Romeo Racing Italiano is the latter.  I am better suited to the former.  Complex, hardcore racing games demand at least a rudimentary knowledge of how racing cars work, things like gear shifting.  They require finesse, and understanding of car handling, and other car-knowin’ stuff  that I ain’t got.  I knew within 5 minutes of “playing” Alfa Romeo that this game was not for me.  I made just such a comment to my wife and the conversation went something like this:

                                               
Me: This game sucks!
Her: No, it doesn’t, you just aren’t any good at it.
Me: No, this game sucks, it’s too hard to steer, you have no control going around corners, the car sucks.
Her: It might help if you used the brakes.
Me: It’s a racing game, you don’t use brakes, you go forward, fast and you win.  No one ever won a race using the brakes.
Her: You might also consider down-shifting.
Me: Down-what?  What the hell is down shifting?  You just hold down the accelerate button and let off just when you go around curves.  There’s no shifting.
Her: Yes, there is.  In games like this you have to drive like it’s a real car.
Me: Nuts to that.  This game sucks and I’m going to go write my review and tell everybody that this game sucks.
Her: Maybe you’re not qualified to write this review…


And it pretty much was downhill from there.  I’ve not played much Alfa Romeo Racing Italiano since that conversation.  My wife continued to play for another half hour or so, but her car kept exploding just as much as mine did.  She still defends it, and I guess she is right, to a point.
Alfa Romeo Racing Italiano is probably an alright game if you are big into Gran Turismo or racing games of that ilk.  The game seems to have some depth, from what I read in the instruction manual. Both you and your car gain experience points for doing well in races and you can use those points to improve your driver stats and your car’s components. There are different challenges to take on and cars to win, plus you have this bizarro "Tiger" power that enables you to roll back time about five seconds during a race in case you need to correct a fatal error or salvage a cheap win by an opponent. Had it been more user friendly, I might have been able to get into this game, but as it stands, I pretty much gave a five dollar bill to a crackhead and said “have at it.” (not sure how much crack $5 buys these days, but all the same).  There is a "quick play" mode that is more fun, where your car doesn't explode after a few collisions, but that is not enough to prop up a game billed as a "racing RPG."

If anyone wants a barely re-used copy of Alfa Romeo Racing Italiano, leave me a comment and I’ll send it off to you for the low price of $5 and you can try it for yourself.  I’ll even cover the shipping.  I promise this will never make it back into my PS2.

Girl on Girl Games: Barbie

Girl on Girl Games: Barbie for NES

Barbie in full early 90's regalia

It would be pretty easy to dismiss as a standard girl game but for one thing:  this game is not terribly easy. Barbie is only a girl game because it is themed in accordance with the Barbie doll franchise. Underneath the veil of pink emblems, charm bracelets and shopping malls, it's really just a standard platform-er, with all the usual trappings.

Barbie takes us on a trip through Barbie's dreams, most of which center on her plans for the next day. While she's not exactly planning to turn the world upside down with her daily errands, they seem like pretty reasonable errands for a teen-age doll in Southern California. She needs to go to the mall and buy a new outfit, go swimming, have lunch at the soda shop, and then meet Ken at a party. Barbie recounts all this to us as she nods off to sleep reading a book about mermaids.

She may be a vapid blond doll, but at least she's reading a book. Enjoying it, even!

As previously stated, the game works as a standard platform-type. You play as Barbie (who is very obviously a pixelated doll) in the game. Her sprite is very tall and thin, and is always depicted in different outfits appropriate to the venue. For example, in the first level, she's wearing a plain athletic top and pants, but after the first mall level, she picks up a new ensemble (the one from the title screen). During the soda shop level, she wears a poodle skirt and sweater. And so on. Complaints about this should probably be directed to the doll line rather than the game about the doll line--after all, Barbie is a fashion doll. Why wouldn't she have lots of clothes in a game?

More after the jump!

A Closer Look at Muscle March for WiiWare

A Closer Look at Muscle March for WiiWare

Some video games are all about strategy, be they puzzle games, turn based battle games, or what have you.  Some video games are about precision asking you to make the exact right moves at the exact right time or else.  Then there are games that all about action, full-on in your face, guns blazing, fire pits roaring action.  And then there are games about muscles.  You heard me.  Muscles.

Yeah, you heard me.  Wait until you see this...

So my friend Chris comes over to the house one night last month and amidst our various goings on about how hard it is to find Atari 2600 games in the wild anymore and which NES games are worth $5, the boy says to me “Have you seen that Muscle game for the WiiWare yet?”  Obviously I had not.  So we pull up the trailer for said game on the interweb and oh my dear lord.  One cannot describe what bombards the senses next, so I’ll not try.  Instead, I’ll allow you to judge for yourself.  Here, take a watch:




What the hell was that?  That my friends is the greatest game for the WiiWare yet.  Yes, delete Mega Man 10 and that new Blaster Master game and make room for Muscle March.  The game is insane.  Pure Japanese insanity in all of its glory.  If you thought Katamari Damacy was a head trip you ain’t seen nothing yet. Imagine Katamari, but with nothing held back.  Nothing.  I think that trailer is proof enough.

The premise, if you dare say the game has one, is centered around a group of extremely zealous body builders who are incensed because people keep stealing their protein powder.  The protein nabbing invariably results in a madcap chase wherein the body builders pursue the perpetrator through cities, jungle villages, space stations and even the heavens themselves!  The protein thief will stop at nothing to escape and this means crashing through anything standing in their way, walls, doors, subway cars, forests, asteroids, you name it.  If the body builders are to nab the protein bandit, they must follow suit, literally.  Each time the perp smashes through something they do so in a very specific pose.  The body builders must mimic this pose or be knocked out of the chase.  That’s it.  Run fast enough and pose correctly and you’ll eventually have an opportunity to tackle the vandal and retrieve your precious protein…or will you….

Honestly, the game is ridiculously simple.  Too simple to be as damn challenging as it is.  When you break it down, the game is essentially Simon Says with poses instead of colors.  There are only four poses to play with and all you have to do is copy the fleeing criminal’s pose as it goes through the wall.  It is just that easy, and yet, it’s not.

The game is dizzying.  From the stereotypical J-Pop music to the absurd environments the game does not allow you to concentrate for a single second.  The backgrounds are just plain crazy.  Nevermind the fact that your chase will have you defying gravity, running through all kinds of buildings, subway cars, jungles, mines, space ships, and so on, as you bust through these surroundings there are innumerable distractions screaming for your attention all over the place.  Most of these distractions are in the inexplicable form of cardboard cut-outs of people and animals that are hopping and gyrating about as if they were on popsicle sticks and being puppeteered by hyperglycemic eight-year olds.  Just don’t pay them any attention. In the immortal words of Happy Gilmore when the “earthquake” rocks the miniature golf course, “how the hell am I supposed to do that?”  It will take a strong mind, but it can be done.

And it isn’t just the backgrounds that will have your mind reeling.  The action gets to be intense.  The chase starts out brisk, but manageable.  As you get closer and closer to the protein bandit, the speed of the chase ramps considerably.  Considerably.  The farther you get in the game, the faster you are going to have to react and match poses or be eliminated.  There are times when instinct and luck will benefit you more than reflexes.  That said, the game gets tough, fast.  And if you get too good at the main game, you can always try your luck at the endless chase game variation where you just run as fast and as long as you can.  Of course, that also makes very good practice for the main game.

That is all there really is to it, but let’s call a spade a spade, you’re not going to buy this game (for a paltry 500 Wii Points) for its complexities and depth.  If you’re looking for Final Fantasy XIII, it ain’t here. No, you’re going to buy Muscle March for the head trip, plain and simple.  This is a zany game all about the laughs and absurdity and the “what the frok was that” factor.  The game play is nothing special, but the game is. Muscle March is funny AND fun.

We’ve been playing the game for some time now and I cannot seem to rescue the protein from the Muscle Mech character to save my life.  And yet I keep trying.  Look, I’m not a big downloadable content guy, I think you know that.  I enjoy the Mega Man games and the Virtual Console has finally allowed me to play Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, but all in all, I’m not over the moon about downloadable games the way most people are.  I would not tell you to make Muscle March your next video game purchase if I wasn’t absolutely certain that it would blow your mind.  I’ll not waste your time with more of my nonsense this month, just go play Muscle March and try to reconcile its madness with your rational, sequential brain.

I’ll see you back here next month when I’ll tell you how we got where we are today and why we are worse for it…

Girl on Girl Games: Introduction

Ok, so every once and a while, people start talking about video games and gender roles. They discuss whether or not violent tendencies are reinforced in males, and so on... and then they begin turning a hard eye toward a genre known as "girl games". You've seen them; usually pink, often sporting a "z" where an "s" rightfully belongs, and always based around a stereotypical female pursuit, like fashion, unicorns or baskets of kittens. Because games of this nature can be so irritating to many independent women, it is easy for them to overlook a wide sector of gender neutral games, which I call "games", and announce for all to hear that "girl games" are what they want us to play!

Dead or Alive, while once a rather unique fighting game, is now built on the wobbly foundations seen above.

Let us be completely honest for a moment. There are some pretty stereotypically male games out there, which, I believe are just as ridiculous as the so-called "girl games." Why doesn't anyone get worked up over this? Because it's too easy to catagorize all games without pink labels as "male" games--and we can overlook garbage like rasslin' games, hunting games and games about ladies with huge tits. Those, naturally, are not aimed at the lowest common male denominator. Right.

The cross-promotional outing of the Cabbage Patch Kids on the Colecovision.

Let's face it: those steaming pink piles of ribbon and rainbows are very easy to target. Those are not for burly men with tattoos. They aren't even for skinny men with antique furniture collections. Those games are for little girls who (of course!) aren't any good at playing video games. This is where the gender debate turns ugly. "This is what they expect our daughters to play?" Sometimes this collective female voice harkens back to the very beginnings of "girl games" and blame them for impacting generations of girls.

Just one problem with that: many of these games suck, or are percieved to suck, and no one plays them. And with a few notable exceptions, especially with the advent of the all-gender-popular Nintendo DS, they aren't very popular. Even among girls. The games are too easy, people complain. They aren't relevant, they cheapen the potential of girls... you get the drift. Because games like WWE Smackdown vs. Raw really help Johnny realize his full potential.

In short, I've decided to play some girl games. Yes, I dare say, I'm going to try to play all I can find. Because it's too easy to glibly dismiss these games as mere garbage, to read that a game is about glitter hairspray and determine that the game has no value, sight unseen. In the interest of fairness, I'll be reaching as far back as the Atari for vintage girl games and looking to the most current contributions whenever possible.

Why, you may ask? Because I am (or was) the main target demographic for these games. I'm not a child any longer, but I still remember what it was like to play video games back then. I truly don't believe all of these games are terrible...and I definitely don't believe all of them are as detrimental to girls as we all fear. Oh, I've no doubts that some will curl my hair--figuratively, that is (unless the game is about curling hair.) But I think many more can be relegated to the heading of "harmless".

Yes... Even this kind of thing.

In this series, I will examine a different "girl game" every few weeks (to the extent of my patience) and attempt to assess its potential dangers, values, and basic fun factor.

12 Months, Sixty Dollars and a PS2: June

Prologue
Okay, so my favorite local second hand, MUST HAVE MUSIC AND MORE, has a slew of Playstation 2 games and recently I discovered that a great number of them are being sold for the low, low price of $4.95.  For those of you who have been following along at home, this is how I came across Pryzm , Chapter One: The Last Unicorn, that little gem that I alone made famous last year!  As I was browsing through the stacks the other day I saw a good number of these $5 games that looked at the very least interesting, if not potential diamonds in the rough.  After thinking it over I came to a conclusion:  The PS2 has a vast library and very few catch the attention of the popular culture, but lots and lots of games get released. Somewhere in those stacks of discarded, unloved games must be some really great games just looking for someone to play them and at the risk of five dollars a go, I think it’s worth finding just what is out there.  The result is this on-going experiment, a journey that you and I are going to take through the unwanted library of the PS2.  So strap in, kiddies, we’ve got twelve months, sixty dollars, and a Playstation2 and we’re about to discover what we’ve been missing!

June

Gladius
Lucas Arts

This game just kind of showed up on the shelves at MUST HAVE MUSIC AND MORE over the course of the past couple of months and I considered it for May, but my guy there said it was pretty involved and I knew I would be traveling so I decided to wait.  It turned out to be a good decision.  For you see my friends, what we have here is a steal.  An honest to goodness, steal.  Gladius is worth every penny of its original MSRP, and I know in 2004 someone bought it from Blockbuster for $20 I have the receipt (to the right), heh.  So the fact that this bad boy can be obtained for a mere Lincoln is truly a crime against high quality video games everywhere.  Especially when another local second hand is asking $19.99 for the Wheel of Fortune for the PS2.  What the hell?

Well, while Gladius is no Wheel of Fortune, what it turns out to be is one incredibly deep and fun turn-based strategy game.  Closer to what the original Dungeons and Dragons role playing game was founded upon (wait, WAIT, come back, I realize that I just made reference to the three most socially awkward words in the English language, but I promise I’m going somewhere good with this, just hang out a second), Gladius makes use of real role-playing elements like customization and character building and blends it with a well crafted, turn-based battle system.  The result is a strategy game that requires intelligence and cunning and ends up being a great deal of fun. (see, if I had left out those three difficult words, you’d be thinking about how great this game is and not worried about telling your friends you actually like this game, stick around I promise the game is sweet)

Gladius is a game all about combat, most of which is meted out in various arenas scattered throughout the land.  You command a “school” of fighters who travel throughout the region contesting in these arenas to improve their prowess and win fame and glory for their kingdom.  When the game begins you may chose to fight for the Kingdom of Imperia (think Romans) or the Kingdom of the Barbarians (think Barbarians or “Fringe Peoples” if you are caught up in post modern political correctness).  Whichever you select, you will start with two warriors from that kingdom from which to build your school; ultimately you will be able to support twenty warriors!  The remainder of the game is all about battling it out in the various contests across the land, constantly improving your characters abilities and equipment and recruiting more and better warriors to your school.  There appears to be some manner of plot that is centered around an evil being and the Kingdom you chose to represent, but honestly, that seems more like the trappings of what is expected from adventure games like this and less like an integral part of the game experience.  Oh sure, there is a world map to explore, “random” encounters to engage in , and side quests to help you increase your might, but make no mistake, this game is all about the battling.

Gladius is also all about the time commitment.  Don’t expect to pop this game in for a quick ten to fifteen minute play.  It’s not going to happen.  This game wants most of your Saturday afternoon and all of Tuesday night.  It took me about an hour and half to work through the tutorial levels and really get my school off the ground.  From there, however, the entire world opens up and you are literally free to explore the land and construct your adventure however you want.  The game play is engaging enough to make you want to invest whole chunks of time into it, so don’t worry about the game becoming more like a job.

If you are like me and these kinds of games tend to suck you in (I spent  72 hours straight playing Might and Magic VI back in 1998 when it first came out, but I had a girlfriend at the time and she played it with me, believe it or not), then taking home Gladius for $5 is like finding that rare Oreo that has the double stuffing in the regular pack.  But even if you cannot find it for the steal I did, you should still have this game in your PS2 collection.  I doubt you’ll have trouble finding it for more than $15, and you are going to get every penny’s worth of fun from it, and more!


(final note: I must tell you that this game also sucked my wife in and she has spent more time than I have playing it!  Say that about Dungeons and Dragons! Ha!)